Dr. Thomas Chambers, MD

Most likely, you did pull your hamstring, but it is not that simple. First, is it swollen, tender, or bruised? Soreness is not the same as tenderness. Local symptoms like tenderness to palpation, swelling, or bruising are indicative of a local problem. Those local findings would be more suspicious for a hamstring injury. If yes, is it towards the knee or buttock that it is tender? A proximal hamstring injury is very different than a distal injury. Finally, if it is not tender or bruised, or swollen, it may be sciatica which can be very similar symptoms but very different treatment.

That is a very difficult question to answer with those facts. First, by leg I assume you mean below the knee and not the thigh which is above the knee. Second, did your son remember injuring himself while playing basketball and what was the mechanism. Is her swelling or bruising. Does he have pain at rest. It is less common for children with open growth plates to pull muscles. They more frequently injure the muscle attachment to the bone or the apophysis. Sometimes even pull the bone off. If he is still limping a month later, he should be seen and evaluated by an orthopedic surgeon.

That is old school thinking. It correlated with the not eating before swimming because of the risks of cramping. The more modern theory of exercise is that food before eating is generally helpful. If it is a endurance event, carbohydrates are essential for energy. If it is more of a high intensity training or weight lifting, protein should certainly be part of that preworkout diet.

If your elbow pain is lateral, it most likely is tennis elbow. The medial degenerative enthesophyte is insignificant. Unless it is symptomatic, nothing would be done about it. It likely is indicative of an old injury either acute or more likely repetitive microtrauma.

Sports hernias are a difficult one. First, I always evaluate the hips and a sports hernia patient. Hip immobility can be closely associated with and aggravate a sports hernia. For that, I start with physical therapy for range of motion and stretching. If there is evidence of FAI, that sometimes needs to be addressed. For the sports hernia itself, steroid injections can frequently be curative along with a regimented program of strengthening, stretching, and modalities. Finally, surgical repair of sports hernias is frequently successful. If having a surgical repair, it is essential that you find a surgeon who is experienced at those. In my experience, there are very few surgeons who really understand the anatomy and pathology well. My collegiate athletes typically have to travel out of state for the expertise I require.